


Fake Palindromes

by hauntedd



Category: Orphan Black (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-07-11
Updated: 2017-07-11
Packaged: 2018-11-30 15:41:17
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 361
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11466597
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/hauntedd/pseuds/hauntedd
Summary: “If a coin comes down heads, that means that the possibility of its coming down tails has collapsed. Until that moment the two possibilities were equal. But on another world, it does come down tails. And when that happens, the two worlds split apart.” ― Philip Pullman, The Golden CompassOr: a collection of small stories about things I wish OB was doing with this season instead of what we're seeing on screen.





	Fake Palindromes

It turns out PT Westmorland is a massive tortoise. Ancient and grotesque, he is kept secluded in the house on the hill. The lone living creature in the center of a taxidermied menagerie – all carefully catalogued and left on display for the warrens of dust bunnies throughout the mansion.

Rachel turns to her escort, the silent man with the horrid personal grooming who smells like piss and cheap liquor, and laughs. It’s near maniacal and so unlike her that it feels like it’s coming from someone, somewhere, else, but Rachel’s long used to clinging to the fringes of sanity. She’s willing to do whatever it takes to claw her way back to her vaunted position above all the rest, unknown and untouched, and Sarah Manning’s blood— _her mother’s blood_ —beneath her fingernails is a comforting reminder of just how far she’ll go to achieve it. If she has to use a bloody tortoise to maintain the power she so tenuously holds in her hands, gifted to her by a tableful of faceless overlords, then so be it.

“What’s so amusing?” He asks, pulling her from her thoughts. It’s clear he’s not sure what to make of Rachel’s reaction. Men often have that problem, she knows, and often it’s used to her advantage. She’ll do the same here.

However, her silver tongue is tarnished from lack of use. Too content with the carefully constructed walls that Susan built for her to charm it on command. So she opts for honesty instead.

“A tortoise. The grand leader of Neolution is a reptile.”

“It’s a concept,” he slurs in heavily accented English and Rachel schools her features back into the perfect veneer of disinterest. This muscle she’s had more use for over the past weeks and months and it comes back quickly enough. “Evolution. Neolution. They’re yours to direct. Your mother preferred a slower, more calculated approach.”

“She did.” Rachel agrees and she smiles demurely, imagining Sarah caged and inseminated. Sarah's body cut apart and stitched together, all in the name of science. The one thing that makes Sarah _special_ weaponized against her over and over again.

“But I intend a more rapid pace.”

**Author's Note:**

> Things I wish were true part 1:
> 
> PTDubs didn't exist and Rachel got to reimagine Neolution in her own image.


End file.
